The present invention generally relates to a semiconductor light-emitting device, for example, a GaN-based light-emitting diode (LED).
It is generally desired that a semiconductor light-emitting device, for example, a light-emitting diode (LED) should emit light at a luminous efficiency as high as possible and that light should be emitted to the outside at high light emission efficiency.
Research and development has been conducted in order to improve this light emission efficiency, see, Official Gazette of Japanese laid-open patent application No. 7-153993 and Official Gazette of Japanese laid-open patent application No. 2004-111493. That is, in these semiconductor light-emitting diodes, the end face of an active layer is inclined so that the light emitting direction can be set by forming the shape of the light-emitting diode (LED) chip, that is, the peripheral surface of the LED chip as an inclined surface which is curved in a dented fashion or by forming the shape of the LED chip as a stair-like shape in which the thickness of the chip is decreased substantially. Also, light emission efficiency can be increased by avoiding reflection of light within the light-emitting diode or decay of light can be decreased by decreasing the number of reflections of light within the light-emitting diode to thereby improve light emission efficiency.